ARTICLE - Are Web Phones Next Security Threat?

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Title: Are Web Phones Next Security Threat? Hackers could hide their locations while attacking from a Web-enabled phone.

Source: PC WORLD

by Reuters May 15, 2000, 6:42 a.m. PT

The next threat to Internet security could come from mobile phones, as hackers taking advantage of third generation high-speed access will be able to disguise their location, a Web security firm says.

"Personal computers are at present the weak link in Internet security. Tomorrow, it will be mobile phones," says Herve Bourgois, European chief executive for Check Point Software Technologies.

Bourgois says Wireless Application Protocol technology, which allows mobile phone users to use online services, "will generate more traffic, while UMTS third-generation technology will speed up the process."

"Canny users will thus be able to hack into vulnerable data banks using their mobile phones and store the information on a laptop computer, or unleash a virus before disappearing," says the head of the Israeli company, which specializes in computer security software.

"Security systems will have to be loaded on mobile phones, and passwords giving access to private networks reinforced, particularly as these devices will soon be used for banking transactions," he says.

PREVENTION URGED

For now, Bourgeois adds, companies should ramp up security around workplaces, particularly where they are using private virtual networks branched into public telecom networks.

"Companies have established security systems along the lines of firewalls for their central servers. One can no longer access the networks by the main entrance. But hackers have found the weak spot by going via PCs and can use a 'Trojan horse' such as the Love Bug, which goes in via e-mail," he says.

Employees' home computers that are linked to their company can also be used by hackers to send a virus via the network.

Overloading on Yahoo, America Online, and Amazon sites at the beginning of February, as well as the Love Bug incident, have woken the business world up to how much they stand to lose.

But in fact, companies only own up to having problems when there is no alternative, Bourgeois says.

"Businesses are scared of losing market share to their competitors by owning up to security breaches. The Love Bug cost several hundred million dollars in repairing e-mail addresses, but it's nothing compared to what future viruses could do to hard drives," he says.

"People are realizing that they cannot develop an e-business without security," he says, acknowledging that meant good business for companies like Check Point.

http://www.pcworld.com/pcwtoday/article/0,1510,16703,00.html?cp=reuters

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-- (Dee360Degree@aol.com), May 16, 2000


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